


Spiderweb

by Unsentimentalf



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-16
Updated: 2015-08-10
Packaged: 2018-01-08 23:53:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1138971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unsentimentalf/pseuds/Unsentimentalf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"He's a spider."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Spiderweb

“He’s a spider.”

Charles Augustus Magnussen smiles. He tags the impassioned audio, adds it to the photograph of the man gesticulating at the jury (a hidden courtroom smartphone from one of his reporters- couldn’t go in the papers, of course, but it had come to him) then puts it away, neatly, in the front of the ballooning file and closes that. He pats the printed name on the front in a proprietorial fashion and picks the manilla folder up with the intention of putting it away.

Underneath the file there is a second photograph. Charles looks at it and his smile flattens out into a blank stare. The file for Sherlock Holmes drops back on the smooth desk and a few bits of paper spill from the edges, disregarded. Charles picks the photo up, extremely cautiously, by a corner and carries it suspended well away from his body between finger and thumb.

Most of his rooms are modern or classical but the door he ends up at is high and wide, thick timbered and spiked with metal studs; it's the side door of a Norman country church that he visited for a politician's funeral two years ago. He remembers (of course) adding the lock as well as the heavy bar after certain recent events. There are few other locks down here. The huge rusted iron key turns with creaking reluctance and it takes his entire metaphorical weight against the door to move it inwards.

Inside there is an oak chair with a velvet cushion and a modern office desk, nothing else. The light is from an ancient candelabra of stuttering candles and there are no windows. Charles settles in the chair, draws the bottom desk drawer out and leafs through the four files inside. 

The one he draws out is one of the thinnest in his entire vaults. Five sheets of paper, closely typed, contain nothing but cross-references. Charles places the photo on the desk above the file and picks out the last sheet, adds a reference to the judge, the defence barrister and yet another reference to Sherlock Holmes.

Then he picks the photograph up again. “Spider,” he murmurs to the dark haired man standing in the dock. He is so tempted to attach it to the file but he thinks better of it. He stands, sets the corner of the photo to one of the candles and watches it burn until the smouldering flame reaches his fingers, then drops the last inch or so on the floor and grinds it into the wood with the sole of his very expensive shoe. There is nothing at all recognisable about the final crumpled fragment and he leaves it where it lies. 

Charles returns the file marked Jim Moriarty to the bottom of the desk and pushes it closed with a very real though nebulous sense of danger avoided. The acrid smell of the burned photo lingers in the room as he opens the door to leave. By the time he has a need to return to this room he imagines- he hopes- that it will be gone.


	2. Exposed

Evelyn is nervous.

Charles notices it, as he notices everything. Evelyn Gantry is the finest electronic forger in London and she’s been working for him for several years now, mostly recreating damning document trails that had been successfully obscured. Sometimes it is necessary to demonstrate to a particularly awkward or arrogant person that their misdeeds can in fact be proven, even if the evidence isn’t entirely original. 

Over the years Evelyn has come to believe that their mutual involvement in not entirely legal activities is sufficient to constitute assurance that neither she nor Charles will take any action to expose the other. She has, as a result, gradually relaxed in his presence. Charles could of course ensure that his involvement can be hidden should he need to throw her to any necessary lions, but he doesn’t expect it to be necessary and while she behaves he is content to let her think that she is safe.

Tonight she is nervous, though it is a routine summons. Charles knows why she is nervous, of course. Six hundred thousand pounds was paid into her bank account yesterday. 

He has never objected to her taking other jobs. He’s found the information gathered that way useful, and she knows that he won’t alert her clients to her betrayal. He knows, however that she had not been working on anything significant recently. That suggests a payment in advance for at least three months work. The only people in this business who pay in advance are those who are entirely comfortable with their chances of recovering the fee should they not be satisfied. They are the dangerous ones.

“What do they want you to do?” he asks. Evelyn blinks again but she doesn’t pretend ignorance. She might be nervous but she’s not stupid. 

“Create a complete history.” 

That’s a great deal of work and difficult as well. “Who for?”

“I don’t know who the client is. The character’s a very minor actor called Richard Brook.”

He closes his eyes. Brook, Richard. Not in his index. “Give me the details.”

She hands over a thumbdrive; she’s been expecting the request. “They aren’t nice people,” she warns. “If they find out…”

“They won’t.” He slides the drive into his laptop, opens a couple of files. There are photographs- a young man with dark hair. He looks vaguely familiar. 

Charles closes his eyes once again, opens them to stare past Evelyn. Faces are more difficult than names; there’s no alphabet to file them by. Sometimes all he can do is set a small part of his mind to flick through pages of mugshots. In the meantime he reviews everything else. It’s interesting mainly because “Richard Brook” in the outline doesn’t have any obvious links to anyone in his filing system. It’s a great deal of time and money to create someone unimportant. Why not just use an existing alias? Every criminal organisation has access to those, fully documented, for a fraction of Evelyn’s rates. 

It could be an inheritance, he supposes, or some other variant on “long lost relative”. He glances at the outline again. No, Evelyn has been given a free hand as to birth details and upbringing. The only firm criteria are that the man in the photo should be a struggling actor based in London, and that he should be named Richard Brook.

Charles demands the details of the men who talked to Evelyn but she can recall nothing particular about them except her sense that they were dangerous. They gave her no way to contact them. “Do the work for them,” he tells her, hands back the drive and dismisses her. 

Alone, he sits down at his desk and draws a clean manila folder towards him. “Richard Brook” he writes in black marker on the front, files the documents inside, attaches the photographs of the slightly familiar man and creates a link to Evelyn Gantry. The mugshots have come up blank; unusual but not unknown. Occasionally even his brain can be fooled into thinking it has seen a stranger’s face before. 

A few days later Charles goes to a party, and has a brief conversation with a senior bank security manager who just happens to have learned some of his skills while dealing in stolen credit card numbers to pay his way through university. Two days after that he receives an email with the number of a Swiss bank account. Swiss bank accounts are normally difficult even for Charles but as it happens he has a contact at that particular branch who was once member of an fascist organisation outlawed in several EU states. That link goes to the British Virgin Isles and a company registered there that holds at least eighty million pounds. Fortunately virtually every “director” operating on the BVI is a front for someone doing something illegal, if only tax avoidance, and Charles outsources the application of pressure this time to one of the locals who knows all the specifics. All he gets back from that is a UK mobile phone number. It’s usually all that he needs.

He has an index for phone numbers, and it’s not on that, so he passes the number onto one of the private investigators his papers hire to reverse engineer numbers, with a warning that discretion is necessary. He doesn’t hear anything back for a couple of weeks, but that doesn’t concern him. Richard Brook is only a minor curiosity to him at this stage. Evelyn’s work will take some time longer, and the character won’t go live until it’s done. 

On a Tuesday morning the investigator turns up at his office. Charles has him searched and sent in. 

“Yes?” 

“I’ve got a name for you. For that number?”

Charles nods. 

“It’s a chap called Moran. Sebastian Moran. He’s a security consultant.” 

Charles blinks, and blinks again. He knows who Sebastian Moran is. The file flickers in front of his eyes, the papers spread out in front of his hands, invisible to the other man. The link in red flashes warning, over and over. 

“Does he know you traced the number?” 

The man shrugs, too pleased with himself for getting the name to care very much. “I told him we were the phone company offering an upgrade. Usual spiel.”

Usual spiel. And this idiot has walked into his office, in broad daylight, has asked for him at the open desk. A scribbled footnote- get rid of him. Charles has more important concerns right now. 

He calls Evelyn. Yes, one of the men had a scar. Charles slams the phone down and paces. Richard Brook. He now knows why the face had been familiar, why the photograph hadn’t been in his files. All the enquiries could be traced back to him if the tracer were motivated enough, and resourceful enough. There is no question in his mind but that he is exposed. 

He tries the number. It has been disconnected.

Down to the church door, into the candlelit room. The file seems to spring into his hand, to fall open for him. He skims the close typed pages, looking for something that will help. What he finds is not what he wants to find but it is the best that the folder offers him.

“Cancel everything today,” he snaps at Janine. “And get my car to the front, now.”

 

“Mister Magnussen.”

Here, among the Sirs and the Lords and the Honourables, the lack of honorific is a reminder that Charles does not, and will not be permitted to belong. He quells the familiar surge of resentment. That he can walk into this office, in this building, and speak to this man at an hour’s notice – that is far more significant than all their stupid titles.

“Mister Holmes.” That “Mister” means something completely different, and they both know it. Mycroft gestures him to a seat, offers refreshment.

“What can I do for you, Mr Magnussen?”

“Charles, please.” The tea is in a bone china pot, with a silver sugar bowl and cups so wide and thin that the drink will be cold before either of them finish. Impractical and quintessentially English. 

“Charles.”

“I have come across some information that would be of significant value to your security services.”

Mycroft sips at the ridiculous cup. “Not an infrequent occurrence I imagine, Charles.” 

Dealing with Mycroft Holmes is never easy.“You have a problem in Lithuania.”

No response, of course. He goes on, because otherwise the silence will stretch unbroken. It’s happened before. “I can give you three names that will enable your problem to be solved.”

“And the price?” Holmes is interested, then, for all his calm exterior. The Lithuanian issue could be hugely damaging for the UK government. It’s a pity he has to offer it up but he can afford no half measures. 

“I would like an introduction to someone.”

That gets an almost imperceptible flicker of surprise. Mycroft knows as well as he does that he owns a select number of people at the highest echelons of society. It is many years since he needed to come trading for something as crude as an introduction to anyone. 

“That someone would be?”

The hand holding his own cup doesn’t quiver. “Jim Moriarty.”

Mycroft replaces his cup precisely on the saucer and leans back in his chair. “Getting that gentleman’s attention is not usually that difficult. Might I suggest placing a small advertisement in one of your august publications? Or you could just open a window anywhere in Central London and shout.”

“I do not want to get his attention.” Charles hisses. He’s never been impressed by the English’s attempts at levity. “I want a formal introduction. You have a connection. You could deliver. Yes?”

“I cannot at present imagine circumstances under which I should choose to do so.” Mycroft’s fingers are pressed against each other. Charles can see the fingertips whiten. 

“Lithuania,” he reminds the man. 

“Is a small country quite a long way away, with a relatively insignificant balance of trade with the United Kingdom. If it is a choice between sacrificing our entire Lithuanian interests and facilitating the growth of a destabilising influence at home, it will be one of my less challenging decisions.” 

This won’t do. Charles needs this deal. Why does it have to be Mycroft Holmes whose pressure points are, as ever, infuriatingly difficult to exploit? 

He dips his head, acknowledging the need for a brief concession. “I‘m not interested in any kind of alliance. Moriarty’s interests and operations are illegal. I am a reputable businessman. I have no intention of sacrificing my position by risking involvement with him.” He pauses, tries a flicker of a smile. “Also he appears to be insane. I don’t do business with psychopaths. It is very difficult to find a way to keep them honest.”

“No,” Mycroft agrees. “I imagine that your normal business methods would be nugatory. So why, exactly, do you wish to make Jim’s acquaintance? I can assure you that being in his company is not an entirely comfortable experience.” 

Charles has no doubt of that. It appears that he is going to have to tell Mycroft, in outline at least, what has happened. He tries the tea again. It’s lukewarm already. Horrible. 

“One of my journalistic lines of enquiry has probably come to his attention. I would like to assure him in person that this was entirely unintentional.”

“Ah.” Mycroft’s smile is not at all friendly. “So you’ve stepped on the wrong toes, Charles? An occupational hazard, I would imagine. I’m inclined to simply let you experience the consequences.”

“I am not asking for a favour,” Charles is slowly losing his temper. “I’m offering a deal. Lithuania. I don’t believe that you’d let that situation crash out of control just for the satisfaction of watching him kill me. There is also the risk to our other mutual interests.”

It is an uncomfortably long wait before the man nods. “I’ll see what can be arranged.”

Mycroft sees his uninvited guest as far as the entrance lobby, where Charles unclips the paper security pass and thrusts it at him. “Make it soon, Mr Holmes. The matter is urgent.”


	3. Desires and Fears

Charles Augustus Magnussen spends the next few days in an uncomfortable state of mixed anxiety and intermittent physical arousal.

He has always regarded it as an ironic feature of the modern degree of corruption that the young and extraordinarily beautiful, the very ones that society classes as the most desirable, are the lowest hanging fruit for men of his profession. The closer to physical perfection that their faces and bodies attain the more desperate they are to succeed as models or film stars or pop sensations. The more desperate they are, the more eager they become to perform any act imaginable on the old and frequently ugly men that they think control their fate. No-one needs to corrupt them; keeping them at arms length is the only difficult bit.

He employs people to do that and expects them to do it efficiently. Beautiful young people bore him; he does not want them turning up naked in his bed. Charles sated his appetite for the Helens of Troy and the Adonises many years ago. After that he'd discreetly investigated the possibility that younger still might be more stimulating - his files tell him that there are a substantial number of people who risk a great deal for the experience- but interacting with children in any way is predictably tedious. Preying on the weakest makes for a profitable living but sexually it does nothing for him at all.

The only men and women whose bodies Charles Magnussen wants access to are the ones who truly do not want him to have it. They are the ones for whom control is everything, the ones most accustomed to being in control themselves. He likes to feel those who think they are the most powerful, the most dismissive, the most condescending, squirming helplessly at his touch. Following that last, uncomfortably humiliating meeting an old, half forgotten desire has resurfaced. The combination of that and the ‘other thing’ is strong enough to keep him from sleep half of every night, tossing and fretting in worry and frustration. He desperately wants to get the Moriarty situation done with safely and he really, really wants to fuck Mycroft Holmes.

One of these problems is considerably more urgent than the other. Owning the body of the apotheosis of the British Government will have to wait. This time Charles’ files are little use; he has kept nothing at all in the locked file on Moriarty but the bare list of known contacts, and those only so that he could steer clear of dangerous shoals. He has set his strongest neon flashing and audio warnings around the file on Richard Brook though he imagines that he would be unlikely ever to forget that particular connection even without them.

He wonders if he made the right choice long ago when he first came across the spider. If he had collected information as he did on everyone else he might be in a better position now. Or he might be dead. Charles can’t remember his first encounter with the drifting strands of spiderweb, can’t remember making his decision or the reasons for it; those facts have been carefully forgotten with everything else. He is sure that he had reasons; he is sure that the decision to forget instead of remembering was not made lightly, but it could still have been wrong. Now he will be facing Jim Moriarty with nothing substantially more to call up from his phenomenal memory than has been reported in his own newspapers about the arrest, trial and acquittal.

Charles is woken very early from the third unsettled night to a text message from Holmes; a registration number. His guards report the corresponding car- a dark grey Jaguar- already waiting on the double yellow lines outside the gates. Charles dresses with his usual care- a shower and a neat trim of his short beard cannot be compromised - but with what concessions he can make to speed. He has no objection to inconveniencing Mycroft, should the man have come in person, but he does not want to irritate the third participant in the forthcoming parley.

In less than thirty minutes he is striding empty handed out to the waiting car, flanked by two of his most reliable men. His stomach rumbles slightly in protest; breakfast is usually a leisurely affair, not a couple of breakfast bars. ‘Breakfast bar’; the very name indicates the unnaturalness of the whole idea of squeezing what should be a time for contemplation of the early papers over lightly buttered toast with poached eggs and a pot of strong coffee into four meagre bites of stuck-together muesli, but it was all his kitchen could offer in the way of “eat it right now” at five am.

The car is empty. The chauffeur, a preternaturally calm young woman whose face triggers no records, informs him politely and without emotion that his men may not accompany him. Charles briefly considers insisting but he needs this meeting. If his physical safety is imperilled by either Mycroft Holmes or Jim Moriarty he suspects that two bodyguards won't make an iota of difference. 

He sits alone in the back of the Jaguar watching central London slip by through one way glass. He asks the woman questions. What is her name? What does she do? (She is not a professional driver, that much is obvious.) Where does she live? By the third answer it is obvious that not only is she making up answers as she goes along but that she can't even be bothered to make the effort to pretend otherwise. He has nothing to compel her with. The conversation, such as it is, lapses into silence. 

Twenty minutes. Dawn is making an appearance over the London skyline, a red shimmering reflection from the glass fronted tower blocks. Sailor's warning; Charles recalls the English folk rhyme. He does not like any of this. It has been a long, long time since he last felt compelled to do anything not of his choosing. He soothes his agitation a little by picturing Holmes crawling forward on his plumply naked belly to lick the underside of his testicles. It's always good to have something to look forward to. 

They turn into the Mall and the car purrs to a stop across the road from the Royal Society. The driver opens his door and waits for him to climb out then sets out across the park in the opposite direction. Charles looks with distaste at the dew covered grass and his gleaming shoes and reluctantly follows. 

Someone has set out three low slung striped deckchairs from the pile waiting to be put out later in the morning. They face each other in a colourful triangle. As the woman leads Charles towards them he can see Mycroft perched on the wooden edge of the one facing them, his furled umbrella wedged between his knees to help keep him upright as he watches then approach. Facing almost directly away from him Charles can see the dark shape of a curled up figure through the thin fabric of the second chair. The third is, of course, vacant. 

Charles spares a glance for the rest of the park. He can see a handful of early risers walking towards their Whitehall offices, a couple of people with dogs on the lead and several figures among the trees that surround the open space who seem to be doing nothing in particular. They will doubtless be Mycroft's snipers and Moriarty's snipers, each primed for instant retaliation in kind should their principals be threatened. Charles recognises the neatness of the arrangement while seething at the insult implied in the implementation. They should have invited him to bring his own people; instead he has to rely on Holmes' men for protection and he's not even sure that protecting him will be in their instructions. 

Charles glances down at his shoes again to discover that the grass had been liberally festooned with the droppings of the roaming geese. By now he is definitely not in a good mood. He gives Holmes his coldest look in lieu of a civil greeting and walks around to the vacant deckchair. The small figure of Jim Moriarty, feet tucked up on the gaudy chair, smiles widely at him. Mycroft was right. The man's company is instantly unsettling. 

“Jim Moriarty,” Mycroft says, his voice oddly colourless. “May I introduce Charles Augustus Magnussen?”

“No need.” Moriarty’s voice is high and unstable. “We’ve met before. Isn’t that right, Charles?”

Charles feels as if something has punched him in the stomach. “I’m afraid I don’t remember,” he says. It is the first time for many years that he can say that with complete honesty. 

Mycroft has drawn back, eyes darting between them. “In that case there is no further need of my presence.” He sounds faintly confused and even more faintly relieved.

“Oh, do stay!” Moriarty says, waving a hand from where he is curled up in his deckchair. “I imagine you’re going to find bits of this conversation absolutely fascinating.”

Charles hadn’t been intending to have a fascinating conversation. A brief apology, an explanation of how the trespass occurred, an assurance of absolute non intervention, an offer of some form of surety. All painfully humiliating but of no possible significance to a representative of the British Government. He had been hoping and expecting that Mycroft would depart at the first possible opportunity. The woman has already moved back towards the tree line.

He takes a small envelope out of his pocket, offers it to Mycroft. "Go," he tells the man with all the authority he can currently muster. "This is the information as promised. This meeting has nothing further to do with either your Queen or your Country." 

Mycroft stands to take the envelope, opens it, reads the contents and folds it carefully into his waistcoat pocket. He neither sits down again nor leaves; he appears to be waiting for Moriarty to speak again. Charles is adept at reading power relationships; this is not, as might first be thought, waiting for instructions but rather waiting for any further information that might arise. Holmes is his own man, for the moment. 

“Suit yourself,” Jim says, apparently still good humoured. “But you know we'll only gossip about you if you're not here.” He winks at Charles.

Mycroft’s control over his expression doesn’t appear to falter at all, but he does sit down again right on the edge of the deckchair. For a moment it looks as if it will unbalance and collapse until he jams the spike of his umbrella against the hard earth, his back stiffly upright. He gestures at Charles. “Proceed, then,” he commands.


	4. Offer

There is no going back now, despite the unwanted spectator. Charles needs to clear his account with Jim Moriarty. 

"You will be aware," he starts, looking down on the figure curled in the deckchair, "that certain enquiries..."

"No! No no no no no and no!" Moriarty's voice is sharp. "Charles! Really! It’s not as if you haven't seen how this is done often enough. Start again and do it properly this time." 

Charles certainly does know how this goes. He also knows that anything he freely offers in the way of humiliation will never be enough. Jim will not be satisfied merely by the adhesion of the dirt of the park onto the knees of his expensively tailored trousers. That’s far too easy. Charles recalls some of the things that he has made other people do in vaguely similar situations, and he knows that he can’t bear it, not with an audience. Not with this particular audience. 

He glances at Mycroft. The man has a slight frown, as if this is all just a little too distasteful. It might have been easier in some ways if Holmes had been laughing at him, but when does Mycroft Holmes ever laugh? 

He feels dizzy, nauseous, recognises the symptoms. Too close to panic. He takes a couple of deep breaths. “I will apologise, but I will not grovel.” Charles thinks –hopes- his voice hasn’t been shaking. 

“How disappointing. Oh well.” Moriarty starts to push himself up from the low slung chair. 

Charles cuts to the only bit of his prepared speech that might still save him. “I can help with your project.”

Moriarty settles down again, smiling. “Really? Do tell me how.”

Charles has no idea what, if anything, Holmes knows about Richard Brook. He does not want to give any of Moriarty’s secrets away. “Archives,” he says, simply.

Jim watches him with bright black eyes for longer than is at all comfortable. Then he nods. “Maybe. I’ll think about it. You’ll hear from one of us soon.”

One of us? Charles doesn’t think Jim is talking about Mycroft. He raises an eyebrow. 

Jim gestures back to the treeline. “The people with guns. Or me. Depending on whether I can use your offer or not.” He springs out of the deckchair, almost elegantly. “See you soon, boyfriend.” That to Mycroft, and he’s strutting across the park towards his people with guns. 

Mycroft uses his umbrella to lever himself up. “This way. Don’t dawdle” he says to Charles, who understands perfectly well that once Moriarty has cover from Mycroft’s snipers they are no longer safe in the open. He follows Mycroft’s rapid stride, fighting back nausea. That had not gone the way he’d hoped and he has no idea whether he will now be targeted by Moriarty’s men or not. 

They end up in an anonymous Whitehall office no more than a couple of hundred yards from where the St James Park confrontation took place. Charles has nothing much more to say to Mycroft but the man’s people have crowded him along that far without giving him any options; the debriefing is apparently compulsory. He gets his attack in first. “Boyfriend?”

Mycroft grimaces slightly. “A joke. Of sorts.” He doesn’t seem entirely sure of that.

“Is he a homosexual?” Charles asks. Keeping no records of Jim Moriarty has done him no favours so far. He intends now to find out everything that he can. 

That gets a blank look. “I’m not sure the term is entirely relevant. He’s a predator.” Eyes flicker down the front of Charles’ suit. “Like you” hangs unspoken.

Charles wonders if Moriarty has at some point preyed on Mycroft Holmes, whether Jim shares his own predilection for sexually humiliating powerful men. There is something between them, undoubtedly, something more than official secrets. All he has retained in his filing system is the record of a link between Moriarty and Holmes; he has deliberately forgotten the nature of that link. Maybe he can dig it up again. He would very much like to have more useful material on Mycroft Holmes. The man is slippery and extremely powerful.

“When you asked for this… introduction, you did undertake not to work with Moriarty,” Mycroft says. His hands are folded on the desk in front of him. 

“I don’t want to,” Charles tells him. “However a small amount of assistance might keep me alive.” 

“A small amount?” Mycroft stretches his fingers out and then refolds his hands. “What is this project?”

“I won’t tell you, obviously.” Charles says. “I know very little about it myself, having come across it entirely by accident. It does not as far as I know involve any serious crime or any threat to the United Kingdom’s national security.”

“And if you find out that it does?” Mycroft asks.

Charles doesn’t bother answering that. He has no obligations to the Crown. 

“When did you meet Moriarty before?”

Charles shakes his head. “I don’t remember.”

“With your remarkable memory? Is that normal?” Mycroft asks.

“No.” He doesn’t intend to discuss his filing system with Holmes but nor does he want the man to start thinking he is regularly fallible. “As far as I know the event is unique.”

Mycroft watches him for a few more seconds. Charles is slowly calming down. He can handle Holmes. The man is extremely unlikely to try to have him killed. Charles has power over a lot of the people that Mycroft needs to manipulate; they frequently work together, if not precisely amicably, then at least efficiently. Without the pressure that Charles can bring to bear on recalcitrant individuals Holmes would find it considerably more difficult to run the British Government; without the leverage that Holmes can exert on the administration of certain laws relating to monopolies, accounting and libel Charles would find running that part of his media empire that is based in the UK rather more troublesome. They could both survive without the other, undoubtedly, but not without inconvenience.

It would be far better of course to have some direct control over Mycroft Holmes, rather than have to rely on mutual advantage. Not just to enable him to pursue certain of his own desires but, more importantly, to have that power at his beck and call without the need for negotiation. That is where Jim Moriarty might potentially come in useful, if Charles can stop the madman from just blowing his brains out on a whim. That “boyfriend” still echoes in his brain. An opportunity.

Charles watches Mycroft watching him, and he thinks about certain people high up in the security services who might know something, who might be pressured into telling him something, given certain things that he knows about them. It is not possible to successfully blackmail Mycroft’s people on an ongoing basis; the man somehow knows the instant that any pressure is brought to bear and the consequences are seldom helpful. But it is theoretically possible to extract historic information on a one time only basis. Holmes will find out of course but by then it will be too late. 

Eventually Mycroft sighs. “There comes a point,” he says, looking down at his hands, “when I cease to be either able or willing to protect you. You are very close to that point now.”

That makes Charles’ decisions considerably easier, but he doesn’t tell Mycroft that. He nods and stands. No-one tries to stop him leaving this time. 

 

Charles keeps things low key for the next few days, waiting. On the fifth day he gets a request from Evelyn Gantry for a meeting. This time she is even more nervous; she does not look at his face as she recites what she has been told to say. 

“They want certain changes to the newspaper archives, both electronic and paper. The details are here.” She uncurls her hand around a memory stick, lets it fall to the desk, but does not quite have the nerve to push it over to him.

He has, in the past, occasionally made tiny changes to the official archives of his various publications. It is very rarely necessary and it carries a distinct and usually intolerable amount of risk. If anyone whom the public regards as trustworthy has copies already and the changes are spotted there is always the possibility of exposure and that could be disastrous. Evelyn knows this. She believes that there is no possibility that he will risk this for her anonymous client’s benefit. She expects not just to be refused but to be refused with extreme prejudice, hence her anxiety.

Charles is hugely relieved. Moriarty has found a use for him. He will not die just yet. He reaches out to sweep the small device up and drop it into the lapel pocket of his jacket. “Forty eight hours,” he tells her. 

He has information now. He is fairly sure that he could get a copy of that memory stick to Mycroft without Moriarty finding out. That might keep Holmes on his side for a little longer, though with an obvious risk. Charles is agnostic about the data; he doesn’t care in the slightest what insane scheme Moriarty is up to. Holmes on the other hand might feel it incumbent on him to throw a few spanners in the works, spanners that Jim might well trace back to Charles.

No. He will keep Mycroft out of the loop. Furthermore, he will arrange for all Mycroft’s people that he can reach to be brought in and quizzed simultaneously. This will permanently destroy his co-operative relationship with the man but if successful will give him the pressure points that he needs to make Mycroft Holmes do what he is told. Then, with Mycroft and the British Government at his beck and call, he can turn to the really serious question of how to stop Jim Moriarty putting a bullet in his head.


	5. Open War

Charles Augustus Magnussen has at least one thing in common with the rest of the human race. He thinks himself a great deal less transparent than he actually is.

Mycroft has observed the whole process that the man has gone through in deciding to finally betray him, from the initial flickers of unpleasantly graphic wishful thinking through to the formation of definite plans. He does not know precisely what those plans involve but since this is Magnussen there will undoubtedly be an attempt to blackmail anyone who the man thinks has useful material on Mycroft Holmes. 

The timing is not at all coincidental. Charles knows better than to think he can just throw in his lot with Moriarty. There is history there that Mycroft has yet to uncover, but Magnussen is clearly aware that Jim is even more murderously dangerous to his supposed allies than to anyone else. Charles cannot afford (and more importantly knows that he cannot afford) to jettison what limited protection Mycroft represents. That means that this betrayal must have as one of its main aims the retention of Mycroft's influence, which in turn means that the intention is to end up effectively controlling him. 

It's an ambitious undertaking. Others have tried and failed before. Nonetheless a full, unscrupulous and thoroughly illicit investigation is bound to reveal that even Mycroft Holmes has vulnerabilities. A handful of those, unfortunately, are even real. 

Following the meeting with Moriarty and the conversation with Magnussen Mycroft sits at his desk and thinks. Occasionally someone arrives with matters of more or less importance, and he deals with them or delegates as appropriate, but for most of the remainder of the morning he cogitates in silence. Charles he could deal with, under normal circumstances, but these are very much not normal circumstances. And there is one thing that seriously worries him about the encounter just past almost as much as it gave him cause for relief, one thing that makes that particular conversation unique. Jim Moriarty did not once mention Sherlock. 

Eventually he starts to do the things that must be done. Three of his senior people, good people, are now security risks because they have friends or family who are in some key way less good people but that they will nonetheless try to protect. Mycroft has a certain amount of… not sympathy, exactly. Identification with that position. It does not affect the decisions that he now must take. 

For two of them he need take no action except to make sure that they remain in London and available to Magnussen for the next few days. The third will fly out to Moscow this evening to take over the ongoing discussions with Putin’s people about fuel security. Charles will not find her absence suspicious; he will be more than satisfied with his two informants and a few smaller fry further down the ranks. 

There is a woman who will find herself in a difficult conversation with Magnussen, shortly after Mycroft’s people betray him. Mycroft briefly thinks about alerting her, decides against it and turns back to his overflowing in-tray. 

For the next few days he does nothing overt about either Moriarty or Magnussen, and he also stays well away from Baker Street. 

* * * * * * * * * * *

Charles generally prefers to make an initial visit to his victims in their own homes. The sense of helpless violation it engenders is useful, of course, but mostly he just likes looking round other people’s houses uninvited.

He can’t do that with Mycroft’s people. They need to be secured simultaneously and then isolated so that he can conduct each interview in turn without the otherwise certain risk of Holmes’ interference. One of the more useful prospects is, rather annoyingly, out of the country indefinitely. He considers the list of potential employee names, positions and known weaknesses and decides that even without her he has more than enough to go ahead anyway. Five people, two of them very senior; it is almost inconceivable that he will come away empty handed. 

He makes the arrangements. They are complex and expensive and each additional person he needs to hire or press gang into acting is an extra risk of a premature word getting back to Mycroft. He is very, very careful and the five abductions go without a hitch. 

He was wise to be careful. Within ten minutes of making his move he is getting reports that Mycroft Holmes is cancelling his meetings for the day. On coming out from the first subject (one of a small pool of Whitehall drivers that Holmes uses, adolescent son responsible for some rather high profile and extremely illegal threats to women on Twitter in the misplaced confidence of web anonymity, some fairly low grade information about certain unusual places visited) he is told that Mycroft and entourage has arrived at Charles’ office, has overridden his security system and is in the process of reducing his normally robust PA to helpless tears. 

Since she doesn’t know where Charles is or what he is doing this doesn’t matter in the slightest. He has carefully tidied up his computer system prior to starting his offensive- Holmes will find nothing useful there even in the unlikely event that he gets into the system. The man has a limited time in which to cause trouble; Charles will find something in the next few hours to keep him to heel. All he needs to do is to keep going. Time for a conversation with subject number two. 

* * * * * * * * * * *

So far, so good. Charles has picked up five of the six people that Mycroft expected. Mycroft has responded with every countermeasure at his disposal. It is even possible that some of them might work, and that Magnussen will be forced to back down. That would be a useful outcome, but not the most probable.

Mycroft strides across the pavement from Magnussen’s office to the waiting car. Warrants have been issued, two of Charles’ most prominent newspapers are currently in lock down with police swarming everywhere. This war could get ugly very soon indeed. All, then, going according to plan. 

His assistant leans over to him as he gets inside. “Two more of ours not responding.”

Mycroft frowns, for the first time genuinely taken aback. Two? “Who?”

“Martins and Ikole.”

Neither were on his list. He is not aware of anything in the background of either that would make them prey for Magnussen, and he has most certainly looked. Martins is probably going to provide little more than Charles will get from the others anyway, but Ikole has been involved in the most sensitive of his recent operations. Ikole knows about Moriarty. 

“Back to the office,” he says to the driver, and to his assistant, “Get me the files on both.”

 

* * * * * * * * * * *

There is an address in Kensington that Holmes visits, irregularly and with great discretion. One of Charles’ better paparazzi snaps a photo through the window. A woman, late thirties, short brown hair, strong features. Neighbours report an American accent. That's enough for Charles to place the face. Her name's Esther Macabee and she's a CIA agent. 

There are legitimate reasons for Holmes to be visiting a London based foreign agent off the radar. There's no obvious leverage there. Charles assigns an aide to look into Macabee’s presence in London and goes back to his questioning looking for something better, something personal, something corrupt. Maybe family, if he can't find anything work related. What about the parents? 

The parents are no longer at home. They vanished soon after his first move. It is probably for the best. Charles cannot safely harass anyone he doesn't have leverage over; this country has laws about that sort of thing. He is wondering whether to try investigating the brother further when the aide gets in touch. She has traced a marriage certificate, dated five months ago, a ceremony conducted in Liverpool registry office , of all places. KarenWelsh, the name used by Macabee, and Mike Holmes. 

That is something Charles isn't expecting. He gazes at the blown up photo of the certificate on his laptop, files it away. A clandestine marriage to an American spy is undoubtedly the sort of discovery that he'd been hoping for but now that he has it he feels slightly uneasy. There is no need to be concerned. Macabee is still at the house. Now that he had something he can visit her, gauge the situation, find out a little more. He arranges for a car to take him there immediately. Holmes is reported to have returned to his office for the moment. 

Charles is on the doorstep within half an hour. Macabee seems puzzled by his visit but not visibly concerned. Mycroft's people clearly had no instructions about keeping her informed. She denies all knowledge of Holmes until he produces the certificate, then she shuts down. CIA training to resist interrogation is effective. 

Information on Macabee's family and on her work comes flooding into his phone from his people back at headquarters and he uses it all, but to little avail. Eventually he loses all patience and he seizes the copy of the marriage certificate, turns it over, sketches on the reverse a tabloid headline and the first two paragraphs of the column to go underneath. She looks at it, pales and breaks.

It is, apparently, a love match, unlikely as Charles finds the idea. There is even a child on the way, expected in some six months time. Neither of them would be permitted by their respective governments to fraternise to this extent; one or both would be forced to resign. More seriously, there would undoubtedly be official questions over a certain joint operation undertaken eight months ago in which Macabee's well being might be thought to have been prioritised by Holmes to the detriment of two now deceased British officers. It is golden stuff and Charles files it all away with great pleasure. 

Charles has done with Mrs Holmes. He leaves her sitting in shock on her expensive sofa and has himself driven back to central London. He orders the release of Mycroft's five people in the meantime. They won't cause trouble. They will talk to Mycroft, of course, but that's part of the point. He gets back to his secretary, tells her that she can now arrange a meeting with Holmes at the other man's convenience. Charles has won and he's in the mood for gloating.

* * * * * * * * * * *

They meet at Charles’ offices, now moreoreless restored after the earlier raid. 

“Good afternoon,” Charles says. “I believe we have an item to discuss. A woman.”

“No.” Mycroft says. His face is a mask of disapproval. “I will not talk to you until my people are released.”

“You’re slipping,” Charles is smug. “All five of your people left my premises twenty minutes ago. Do try to keep up.”

“Five?” Mycroft’s frown deepens. A sudden realisation and he starts to his feet, fast for such a normally deliberate man. “You are an idiot, Magnussen. If they are harmed I will treat you as entirely responsible.” 

“You can’t leave,” Charles tells him. “I have this.” He waves the marriage certificate into Holmes’ face. Mycroft takes it, glances at it and shoves it into a trouser pocket that has never been used to hold mundane items before. 

“Not now,” he tells Charles. “I have the consequence of your actions to deal with first. So do you. I warn you again, if Moriarty does not return my people I will have you out of this country for good, regardless of what your games may have come up with. I suggest you put whatever influence you think you may have to ensuring that they are recovered.”

“Moriarty?” Charles reaches out a hand to hold Mycroft back. “Give me the details.”

Mycroft waves at his assistant. “Do it, and ensure he does everything he can.” He pulls away from Charles and strides away down the stairs, the perfect line of his suit trousers broken by the crumpled piece of paper in his pocket.


End file.
